RE: charging lipos
Most high-end chargers run off of 12-15V, and you have to buy a switching DC power supply separately. I prefer this to having the AC/DC power supply built into the charger, since that just adds extra weight if you want to take the charger to the field and run it off of your car battery. If you get one good 10-20A supply you can run several chargers off of a single supply.